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| Toynbee "Cicilia" |
island of Sicily,
[Inf. xii. 108];
[Purg. iii. 116];
Cicilia,
Conv. IV. xxvi. 11,
Conv. IV. xxvi. 14; Sicilia,
V.E. I. viii. 8,
V.E. I. x. 1,
V.E. I. xii. 4; Trinacria,
[Par. viii. 67],
V.E. I. xii. 3;
V.E. II. vi. 5; Trinacrida mons,
Egl. iv. 71
[Mongibello]; alluded to as l'isola del foco,
[Par. xix. 131]; quella terra,
[Par. xx. 62]; the sufferings of the
island under Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse,
[Inf. xii. 107-108]
[Dionisio_1]; Manfred (in Ante-Purgatory) speaks of his
daughter Constance, wife of Peter III of Aragon and Sicily, as
genitrice / de l'onor di Cicilia e d'Aragona ('the honour
of Sicily and Aragon' being either her eldest son, Alfonso III,
king of Aragon, who succeeded to both crowns, but had resigned that
of Sicily to his brother James; or her two younger sons, James and
Frederick, who at the time were kings of Aragon and of Sicily,
respectively),
[Purg. iii. 115-116]
[Alfonso_1:
Aragona];
Charles Martel (in the Heaven of venus) speaks of the island as
la bella Trinacria (there being probably a special
significance in his use of this particular name), and refers to the
fog which overhangs its E. coast,
[Par. viii. 67-70]
[Catania, Golfo di:
Trinacria]; he says that his descendants would have
been ruling in Sicily if the misgovernment of his grandfather,
Charles I of Anjou, had not brought about the massacre of the
French at the 'Sicilian vespers'
([Par. viii. 71-75])
[Carlo_1:
Carlo_3]; the
Eagle in the Heaven of Jupiter refers to the island as l'isola
del foco (on account of the eruptions of Etna), in connexion
with Frederick II of Aragon (king of Sicily, 1296-1337), and
alludes to the fact that Anchises died there,
[Par. xix. 130-132]
[Anchise:
Federigo_3]; the Eagle refers to it again, in
allusion to its sufferings during the war between Frederick of
Aragon and Charles II of Naples, as quella terra . . . che
piagne Carlo e Federigo vivo,
[Par. xx. 62-63]
[Carlo_2]; Aeneas
leaves there his aged followers in the care of Acestes,
Conv. IV. xxvi. 11
[Aceste]; Aeneas trains Ascanius in warfare there,
Conv. IV. xxvi. 11
[Ascanio]; and institutes games in memory
of Anchises,
Conv. IV. xxvi. 14 [Enea]; Sicily one of the S. limits
of the Italian language,
V.E. I. viii. 8; to be reckoned with
Sardinia as being on the right side of Italy, if the Apennines be
taken as the dividing line (from N. to S.),
V.E. I. x. 7; its
dialect distinct from that of Apulia,
V.E. I. x. 8; the seat of the
Court (in the time of the Emperor Frederick II), whence the name
Sicilian applied to Italian poetry,
V.E. I. xii. 4; the Sicilian
dialect the most famous of all the Italian dialects, both because
all poems written in Italian were called Sicilian, and because many
important poems were written by Sicilians,
V.E. I. xii. 2; this
fame a reproach to the princes of Italy, who neglected letters,
V.E. I, xii. 3; the common Sicilian dialect unworthy of preference, that
spoken by the nobles worthy of commendation, but neither the
Sicilian nor the Apulian to be reckoned the most beautiful dialect
of Italy,
V.E. I. xii. 6-9; the Italian vulgar tongue employed by
Sicilian poets,
V.E. I. xix. 1; the fruitless expedition of Charles
of Valois against Sicily,
V.E. II. vi. 5 [Carlo_4]; Etna the most
rich in pasture of all the Sicilian mountains,
Egl. iv. 71-72.
[Ethna].
The name Sicily is sometimes loosely applied to the kingdom of
the Two Sicilies, comprising Naples (Apulia and Calabria) and
Sicily proper. This kingdom was ruled successively by Norman (1129-1194),
Swabian (1194-1266), and Angevin (1266-1282) sovereigns
[Napoli:
Puglia].
In 1282 the Sicilians rose against the house of Anjou and
expelled the French after the massacre known as the 'Sicilian
vespers'
[Vespri Siciliani]. This revolt led to the
separation of the two kingdoms, Sicily passing to the house of
Aragon, while Naples remained in the hands of the Angevins
[Carlo_1:
Carlo_2:
Federigo_3:
Iacomo_1:
Table IV:
Table IV a].
[See E. Moore, 'Dante and Sicily', in SiD, ii,
pp. 269-302; and F. Torraca, Il regno di Sicilia nelle opere di
Dante (Palermo, 1900).]
©Oxford University Press 1968. From A Dictionary of Proper Names and Notable Matters in the Works of Dante by Paget Toynbee
(1968) by permission of Oxford University Press